SC upholds Arroyo's plunder acquittal with finality

ABS-CBN News

MANILA - The Supreme Court has dismissed with finality the plunder case of former president and now Pampanga Rep. Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.

Arroyo was accused of conspiring with other PCSO officials in misusing P366 million in Philippine Charity Sweepstakes Office (PCSO) intelligence funds from 2008 to 2010.

In a resolution made public on Tuesday, the high court, voting 11-4, denied a motion for reconsideration to reverse its July decision clearing the 70-year-old Arroyo from the case.

SC noted that it had junked the charges against Arroyo due to insufficient evidence and any attempt to reconsider the
decision "would amount to double jeopardy."

The Office of the Ombudsman had lodged the plunder case against Arroyo in 2012. She was detained at the Veterans' Memorial Medical Center in the same year.

In 2015, Arroyo’s camp filed a case with a United Nations panel to complain of the alleged human rights abuses she suffered under the administration of President Benigo Aquino III, who pursued the filing of cases against her.